About
Hiring a contractor is the largest purchase most people make with the least information.
A car has a VIN, a service history, and a price anyone can look up. A twelve-thousand-dollar roof has a guy in a truck and a number written on a page. That asymmetry is the entire problem, and nobody in this industry has much incentive to fix it.
Three things break, in order
Failure one
You can't get three quotes
Everyone says get three. Almost nobody does. Two contractors never call back, the third reschedules twice, and you take the bid you have because you're tired and the water is still coming in.
Failure two
The quotes aren't comparable
Three prices for "the same job" that assume three different scopes. One includes the decking, one calls it an allowance, one doesn't mention it. There's no way to read the difference from the outside, so people pick the low number.
Failure three
The referral sites made it worse
The big platforms sell your phone number to whoever bought the lead. The contractor pays for you before they've seen your job, and that cost lands somewhere. Usually in the bid.
So we built the boring version
QuoteVet isn't a directory and isn't a marketplace. We work for you, and only you.
We're on one side of the table. Contractors don't pay us for your phone number. That single decision changes every other decision downstream — who we let in, who we recommend, and what we're willing to tell you about a bid.
We do the chasing. Most of the value here is unglamorous: following up, confirming appointments, and not letting a quote go missing. Software is good at this and people are bad at it.
We read the fine print. Every quote gets checked against the same list, so the comparison is between like and like instead of between three sales documents.
How we're different, specifically
| Lead-gen sites | QuoteVet | |
|---|---|---|
| Contractors pay | Per lead | Nothing |
| Who they answer to | The platform | You |
| Your number | Sold to several | Never sold |
| Scheduling | Your problem | Handled |
| Quote analysis | Up to you | Line by line |
| Ranking | Influenced by spend | No paid placement |
Every contractor on your list goes through the same five steps, and nothing in that sequence is for sale. Here is exactly what each one is — including what it does not cover.
Fig. 9 — The standard
Five steps, and none of them are for sale
Fig. 9 — five steps, one loop
Contractors enter on the left. Anyone who doesn’t fit the trade or area drops out the bottom; everything else is recorded and shown to you, and the loop runs again on every project.10
Trade and area fit
What we doEvery contractor is matched against the specific trade your project needs and the area they actually work in, with a real business phone and email confirmed before anyone is contacted. Listings we can't verify as real are dropped rather than padded onto your list.
Why it mattersThe most common way these lists get filled is with a general handyman and a scraped phone number. A roofer who doesn't roof in your county is not a quote, it's a wasted afternoon.
12
Credentials, asked and on the record
What we doWhen a contractor books a visit or sends a quote, we ask directly about state licence, general liability insurance, workers compensation, and whether the crew on site will be subcontracted. Every answer is recorded against the contractor and shown to you.
Why it mattersMost homeowners never ask, and a contractor who won't answer plainly has told you something. Recorded answers also mean a contractor can be held to what they said.
14
Red flags, recorded not discarded
What we doEvasiveness about insurance, refusing to put a scope in writing, vagueness about who actually shows up — all of it is captured at the time it happens rather than forgotten between calls.
Why it mattersThis is the part a directory structurally cannot do. It has no relationship with the contractor beyond selling them your number.
16
It follows through to the quote
What we doThose recorded answers feed the quote analysis. A contractor who wouldn't confirm licence or insurance has their credentials score capped, and any concrete red flag caps their reputation score, no matter how good the number on the page looks.
Why it mattersA cheap bid from someone who dodged the insurance question is a different product than a cheap bid from someone who didn't. You should be able to see which one you're holding.
18
Behaviour over time
What we doThe things only time reveals: turning up for the window they claimed, and sending a real itemised quote afterward. Anyone who asks not to be contacted is flagged permanently and never appears again.
Why it mattersChecking once at signup is marketing. Watching what actually happens on each project is the part that compounds.
What we do not claim: we record what a contractor tells us about licensing and insurance, and we show you their answers — we do not currently pull certificates or query state licensing boards ourselves. Verify licence and insurance directly with the contractor and your state before you sign anything. We will say plainly on this page when that changes.
Where we actually are
Early access — the honest version
QuoteVet is new. We work anywhere in the United States, but coverage isn't uniform — whether we can help depends on how many qualified contractors work near you in the trade you need. Some zip codes we can serve today. Some we can't yet.
So we check first, before anything starts. You'll get more attention than a bigger platform would give you, and you'll also sometimes hear us say no. We'd rather do that than take on your project and hope it works out.